Ó Muilleoir champions digital excellence

Date published: 26 May 2016

The Minister was speaking after his department won a prestigious European award for excellence in transformation for the nidirect programme in Dublin this week.

Visiting the General Register Office, where members of the public can search their family history online, the Minister said: “Government needs to find better and smarter ways of doing business if we are to keep pace with demand for services. There is a real appetite for engaging online and we have a duty to provide secure and easy access to public services. We must embrace a digital first agenda to deliver effectively for our citizens and the business community.

“I am impressed by what has been achieved to date to advance the digital transformation programme here. Our department has worked collaboratively across the public sector from 2014-2016, delivering 20 exemplar digital services and some £17million in savings for the public purse.”

nidirect is our official government website, providing a single point of access to public sector information and services. More than 4.5 million digital transactions have been completed on the new digital services in the last 2 years, and this year there were nearly 30 million visits to the nidirect website.

The Department of Finance’s Digital Transformation team won the top prize for ‘Excellence in Transformation’ at the European Shared Services Excellence awards. The Minister said: “This award is testament of not only the importance of digital transformation, but of the tremendous work that has been done across my own department and the wider public sector to create a modern, citizen focussed digital programme. I congratulate all those involved.”